vertical-slicing

vertical-slicing is a skill for Claude Code from tranhieutt/software_development_department. It costs 22 tokens per session (698 once invoked), scanned A, original, MIT.

Guidance for planning and building complete full-stack features as small, user-visible slices. A full-stack feature spans the interface, server code, and data or services behind it.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it to break a large feature into end-to-end pieces, define an API contract, and plan implementation so each piece exercises the real path through the application.
Why use it?
It keeps work organized around a working user outcome and limits complexity behind clear interfaces. Each slice can be demonstrated and checked on its own.

Skill for Claude Code

Written for Claude Code: allowed-tools in frontmatter.

Good fit Use it to break a large feature into end-to-end pieces, define an API contract, and plan implementation so each piece exercises the real path through the application.

Compare 6 skills from other repositories ↓
Install with agentmods
npx agentmods add skills/tranhieutt/software_development_department/vertical-slicing
Install

Getting it into your agent

One page per mod, every tool's command on it. A separate URL per tool would split the same page into five that compete with each other.

Any agent
npx skills add tranhieutt/software_development_department --skill vertical-slicing
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/tranhieutt/software_development_department

Made for: Claude Code.

Wrote this? Show the measurements

A badge with what this costs and how it scanned, read live from this page, so it follows the numbers instead of freezing them. Markdown for a README, HTML for a documentation site or a project page.

agentmods badge for vertical-slicing

README.md
[![agentmods](https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/tranhieutt/software_development_department/vertical-slicing/github.svg)](https://agentmods.dev/skills/tranhieutt/software_development_department/vertical-slicing)
Your own site
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/tranhieutt/software_development_department/vertical-slicing"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/tranhieutt/software_development_department/vertical-slicing/github.svg" alt="Measured on agentmods" height="20"></a>

Or the 80×15 button, for a site that already has a row of RSS and ATOM ones. Only the verdict fits; the numbers stay here.

agentmods 80×15 button for vertical-slicing

Your own site · 80×15
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/tranhieutt/software_development_department/vertical-slicing"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/tranhieutt/software_development_department/vertical-slicing.svg" alt="Reviewed on agentmods" width="80" height="20"></a>
Per session 22 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 698 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan A 0 findings. A grade says what 26 rules found in the file — not that it is safe.
Origin original No closer match found in the catalogue.
Token cost

What it costs to keep this loaded

Counted locally with the o200k_base tokenizer, which is exact for GPT models; Claude uses its own tokenizer and its counts differ. Treat this as one consistent yardstick across the catalogue rather than a bill. Prices are per million input tokens.

ModelPer sessionOnce invoked
Fable 5.1 $0.00022 $0.00698
Opus 5 $0.00011 $0.00349
Sonnet 5 $0.00004 $0.00140
Haiku 4.5 $0.00002 $0.00070

Measured 8d ago against content hash 67fb426a984b, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-09-12, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

vertical-slicing scanned grade A with 0 findings against 26 rules in 11 categories — prompt injection, anti-refusal, data exfiltration, privilege escalation, supply chain, agent snooping, system-prompt leakage, SSRF and excessive agency — measured 8d ago.

A static scan of the body, not an audit. Every finding is printed with the line that produced it so you can judge whether it matters here. A mod is markdown that instructs an agent; that is exactly why what it instructs is worth reading.

Nothing flagged

None of the 26 patterns this scan looks for appear in this file: no shell pipes, no recursive deletes, no credential paths, no hidden text, no instruction-override or anti-refusal phrasing, no agent-config snooping. That is not a guarantee, it is the absence of the things that are checkable.

.claude/skills/vertical-slicing/SKILL.md · 71 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 71 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Skill: /vertical-slicing

Use this skill when planning complex fullstack features to ensure delivery by user-value units rather than technical layers.

Vertical slices should not merely cross layers. They should also protect depth: keep complexity concentrated behind small interfaces instead of smearing logic across DB, API, and UI callers.

The Vertical Slicing Workflow

1. Identify the Smallest Value Unit

  • Decompose the PRD into slices that represent a functional path.
  • Example: Instead of "Authentication System," start with "Login with Email and Password".

Good slice shape:

  • Narrow enough to demo or verify independently
  • Complete enough to exercise the real seam end-to-end
  • Small enough that one RED -> GREEN loop can prove meaningful progress
  • Not a horizontal placeholder like "backend groundwork" unless that groundwork is a real prerequisite with its own verification

2. Define the Contract

  • Before implementing, the lead-programmer or backend-developer must define the API contract.
  • Document this in a Design Doc or temporary spec.

Prefer contracts that create deep modules: small interfaces with meaningful behavior hidden behind them. If a contract mostly forwards data or mirrors caller complexity, it is probably too shallow.

3. Plan the Slice Tasks

Organize each phase to contain:

  • Database/Data Model: Schema changes required for this slice.
  • Backend Implementation: Logic and API endpoints.
  • Frontend Integration: UI components and API consumption.
  • E2E Verification: Test verifying the whole path.

For each slice, also record:

  • Blocked by: exact prerequisite slice(s) or None
  • Acceptance criteria: observable end-to-end outcomes
  • Verification: exact command/check for the slice
  • Interface risk: where a shallow seam or pass-through wrapper could appear

4. Implementation Rules

  • Do not confuse "deepest" with "lowest layer". Start where the slice creates the strongest behavior seam, then drive outward through the stack.
  • Do not move to the next slice until the current one is "Integration Complete".
  • If a horizontal change is absolutely necessary (e.g., shared middleware), implement it as a prerequisite phase 0.
  • Apply the deletion test to new wrappers and adapters. If deleting the new abstraction would mostly simplify the code instead of reintroducing complexity across callers, the seam is too shallow.

Read the full file on GitHub · 71 lines

Changes

What this file has done since we first saw it

Hashed on every crawl. A supply-chain change to an agent config is a question of when, not whether, so the history is kept rather than the latest state alone.

  1. 8d ago First seen · 71 lines · 22 tokens per session scan A 67fb426a984b

Subscribe to this mod's changes

vertical-slicing is a skill published in the GitHub repository tranhieutt/software_development_department (72 stars, last pushed 4mo ago), licensed MIT. It adds 22 tokens to every session and 698 once invoked, about $0.0001 per session on Opus 5. A static security scan graded it A with 0 findings. No closer match exists in the catalogue, so it is treated as the original; first seen 2026-09-03.

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